the emerging “Unfinished Business” meme

This makes two years in a row of right-on-the-money motto-making. There’s no way they can keep this up year after year, but Unfinished Business fired me up instantly, especially when I heard Arinze was involved. It encapsulates everything that I’ve been feeling all off-season and everything I’m feeling now, so kudos to them and go ahead and reserve my seat on the bandwagon. Somebody want to send me a shirt here in Beijing?

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In other news, did anyone else catch the nugget* about Carmelo’s new documentary and the revelation that Melo wanted to come back to Syracuse for year 2 but Boeheim encouraged him to enter the draft?!?! Shouldn’t this be a bigger story? Not that I’m necessarily a hater on Jimmy’s move here, it just seems like this admission deserves a little more attention and debate among the SU fan base.

The arguments in favor of Jimmy’s position — assuming Melo’s story is accurate — are numerous: 1) it shows that the coach is genuinely concerned about his players’ best interests; 2) it shows he is honest with his players and will give them appropriate advice no matter what he has to gain; 3) it sends a message to future 5 star recruits that Boeheim is serious about getting them to the NBA and that no one on the Syracuse staff is going to try to guilt-trip them into staying in college longer than necessary. That’s a powerful draw for all the future Melo’s out there (for instance, Melo).

The arguments against Jimmy’s move amount basically to…damn, think of what could have been! Coach, did you really have to open your mouth that day??

On the other hand, we can safely assume that given enough time to think about it, Melo was going to make up his mind to leave anyway. But still…damn.